Yesterday the nominations for the Gotham Awards were announced and no surprise Boyhood led the nominations with four, Best Feature, Best Actor (Ethan Hawke), Best Actress, (Patricia Arquette), and Breakthrough Actor (Ellar Coltrane). Since the film’s release and almost unanimous critical support the film has been the frontrunner for Best Picture. But do the Gotham Awards impact Oscar? Not usually, but their nominees are typically spectacular.

This may be the first year I have seen most of the Best Feature nominees, minus Birdman, which I will be seeing this weekend. The rest of this year’s Best Feature nominees are the brilliant Grand Budapest Hotel, the touching Love is Strange, and the haunting Under the Skin.

Last year’s Gotham picked Inside Llewyn Davis as Best Feature and Moonrise Kingdom the year before, neither were nominated for Oscar. Last year was the first year Gotham did a Best Actor/Actress prize. This was Matthew McConaughey’s first big win for Dallas Buyer’s Club last, and he went on to steamroll the Best Actor competition. Brie Larson was the Best Actress winner; she was not nominated at the Oscars.

Gotham typically honor smaller films that are ignored by Oscar, films like Love is Strange and Under the Skin will probably not make a splash, but watch out for Birdman, and Boyhood, these two are major players, and will likely do well with the Academy. On a side note I am happy to see Bill Hader nominated for The Skeleton Twins, and Oscar Isaac nominated for A Most Violent year, they were both fantastic, and yes I have seen A Most Violent Year.

Best Feature
Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)
Alejandro G. Iñárritu, director; Alejandro G. Iñárritu, John Lesher, Arnon Milchan, James W. Skotchdopole, producers

Boyhood
Richard Linklater, director; Richard Linklater, Cathleen Sutherland, Jonathan Sehring, John Sloss, producers

The Grand Budapest Hotel
Wes Anderson, director; Wes Anderson, Scott Rudin, Steven Rales, Jeremy Dawson, producers

Love Is Strange
Ira Sachs, director; Lucas Joaquin, Jay Van Hoy, Lars Knudsen, Ira Sachs, Jayne Baron Sherman, producers

Under the Skin
Jonathan Glazer, director; Nick Wechsler, James Wilson, producers

Best Documentary
Actress
Robert Greene, director; Douglas Tirola, Susan Bedusa, Robert Greene, producers

CITIZENFOUR
Laura Poitras, director; Laura Poitras, Mathilde Bonnefoy, Dirk Wilutzky, producers

Life Itself
Steve James, director; Zak Piper, Steve James, Garrett Basch, producers

Manakamana
Stephanie Spray & Pacho Velez, directors; Lucien Castaing-Taylor, Véréna Paravel, producers

Point and Shoot
Marshall Curry, director; Marshall Curry, Elizabeth Martin, Matthew Van Dyke, producers

Bingham Ray Breakthrough Director Award
Ana Lily Amirpour for A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night

James Ward Byrkit for Coherence

Dan Gilroy for Nightcrawler

Eliza Hittman for It Felt Like Love

Justin Simien for Dear White People

Best Actor
Bill Hader in The Skeleton Twins

Ethan Hawke in Boyhood

Oscar Isaac in A Most Violent Year

Michael Keaton in Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

Miles Teller in Whiplash

* The 2014 Best Actor nominating panel also voted to award a special Gotham Jury Award jointly to Steve Carell, Mark Ruffalo, and Channing Tatum for their ensemble performance in Foxcatcher.

Best Actress
Patricia Arquette in Boyhood

Gugu Mbatha-Raw in Beyond the Lights

Julianne Moore in Still Alice

Scarlett Johansson in Under the Skin

Mia Wasikowska in Tracks

Breakthrough Actor
Riz Ahmed in Nightcrawler 

Macon Blair in Blue Ruin

Ellar Coltrane in Boyhood

Joey King in Wish I Was Here

Jenny Slate in Obvious Child

Tessa Thompson in Dear White People